Month: January 2018

Friday, January 5, 2018

Another cold below freezing night. It was a really nice sunrise though. We liked our site because we could lay in bed and look out the window out across the water and see the sunrise. Such a peaceful way to start the day. It was another bright sunny day, with a little less wind. We slowly packed up and got ready to head east. Next week is suppose to be nice at Gulf Shores. Last week was nice. We had bad timing this time. Oh well, with Anne not feeling well maybe it was all for the best. She did get more rest since it was too cold to do the biking we had planned to do.

So today was travel day. We left Gulf Shores about 10:00 CST headed for Live Oak, Florida. It was an easy drive with the only significant traffic around Tallahassee. We stopped a couple of times, found a geocache at a visitor’s center, filled up FRED and arrived about 5:00 EST. We will be on eastern time now for the next 6 weeks. Anyway, totally uneventful day.

When we arrived at Live Oak, we went to Lowe’s. We checked inside for permission to overnight in their lot. We stayed here two years ago on the way south. We like it because they close at 9:00 and it’s nice and quiet. After checking in we had supper of split-pea soup (that had been cooking all day in our thermos) and crackers. Then we enjoyed some hot chocolate for dessert. We will leave by the time Lowe’s opens in the morning. We only have about a four hour drive tomorrow. Hopefully it will be as uneventful as today. And tonight should be our last night below freezing. So looking forward to warmer weather. Hope you are having a great weekend and praying for safe travel for all the other NOMADS headed to their projects this weekend.

Thursday, January 4, 2018

Last night was another cold night. The weather all over the country is truly bizarre. We do hope and pray that you are all staying warm and safe. Please, please remember to check on family, friends and the elderly. We are leaving tomorrow and will drive to Live Oak, Florida. It’s been snowing there and predicted to be 25 degrees there tomorrow night. I-10 was closed due to snow IN LIVE OAK, FLORIDA yesterday but has reopened so we aren’t expecting any problems. We are so looking forward to much better weather in Enterprise. 50 degrees will seem balmy.

We started the day going to the morning session at the Nature Center again. Today was a session on raptors, specifically the red tailed hawk. Since we have a red tail that stays around our house we enjoyed learning more about him. It was another great session.

We then returned to FRED to do a little work. We bought some vinyl carpet protector material to make floor protectors to go under the slide rollers. We cut that to size today and will try it out tomorrow to see how it works.

After finishing that project we headed back out to try to get some good photos of the eagles. When we arrived the female was on the nest again. We got a few head shots, changed positions and took a few more. After watching about 20-30 minutes she stood up stretched her wings and stood on the edge of the nest. Then she sat right back down on her eggs. Less than ten minutes later she again stood on the edge of the nest and this time spread her wings and made a quick circle around the nest, landed and was back on the eggs. As she was flying we could hear her calling. We decided that it was past time for Dad to be there to relieve her so she could go get some food. But he was no where to be seen. A few minutes later she again left the nest making an even larger circle and more calling. This behavior surprised us because naturalist Kelly had told us that she never leaves the nest until Dad was there to keep them warm. We think he was in trouble. She again returned to the nest. Just a few minutes later we heard and then saw the male eagle coming toward us. He landed in a nearby tall pine tree. Mom took flight and landed beside him on the limb. They talked to each other a little and then Dad flew to the nest and settled in for his time on the nest. Mom then flew off toward Lake Shelby to find a good meal. Such a treat to get to observe these two eagles. Thank you God for blessing us with opportunity to watch your creation.  (Just a reminder, click on any picture to enlarge the view.)

Next we went to the Gulf State Park Pier. Its the longest pier on the Gulf. Since the weather has been so cold we hadn’t even been to the beach and Anne just couldn’t leave tomorrow without a little visit. We decided to just take a walk out on the pier. However, surprisingly it was closed. It never closes. We walked on out to the water. So pretty and clear. Sand so beautifully white. We have visited beaches all over the world and none are any prettier than the Gulf beaches. Later we saw on Facebook that the pier had to be closed due to the cold. We suspect they had some frozen pipes.

We returned home to have a nice dinner and relax before our travel day tomorrow. We had an unexpected treat. A lady knocked on our door and it was a fellow NOMADS. She saw our magnetic signs and stopped. She and her husband aren’t working projects right now due to some health problems but hope to be back on projects again this summer. Such an unexpected treat !

Another cold, but wonderful day.

Wednesday, January 3, 2018

Wow. We stayed above freezing last night. The first night in forever, it seems. Time to celebrate! This has been such an abnormally long cold spell. The sun came out after lunch but with the wind, the 43 degrees still didn’t feel very warm. We thought tonight was going to be okay too, but they revised forecast and are now predicting 26 again tonight. Doesn’t make us happy.

This morning we went to the Nature Center for a presentation on alligators. It was very well done. They have two little alligators, about 12 inches long, that they used for presentations. They came from Alligator Alley, a nature preserve in Gulf Shores and are on loan for educational purposes. We learned that the gators have 80 teeth when they are born – 40 uppers and 40 lowers. These gators, still being only 4 months old, have tiny needle like teeth. While they may not be able to do the damage of the larger gators, we were told that a bite even at this young age is very painful and once they bite they will not let go. You have to get something like a pencil the pry the jaws open. The presenter held the little one but let us touch them, feel the tail and the back. When these little guys are about one year old they have to go back to the preserve because they become too dangerous to keep at the Center. Mama gators lay lots of eggs each year but probably only one baby will live to reach sexual maturity at 6 years old. They stay with mama until age three. So Mama will have babies, one, and two year olds all at the same time and then kick the three year olds that have survived, out, to go find their own territory. Of course, right now due to the cold weather, there are no gators out in the open in the bogs and canals. They don’t hibernate, but sort of burrow up in the mud to stay warm. We have fairly often seen gators in bogs/marshy areas when we have been here in warm weather. We also got to see the barred owl, hawk and great horned owl again while at the nature center.

Later in the day we went back to the outlets for a little more shopping. We did find a few items we decided to bring home. Then we stopped at the Original Oyster House for dinner. We always enjoy eating there, looking out over the water, and have never been served a bad meal.

Late this afternoon, Kelly, the park naturalist who led our First Day Hike, stopped by for a visit. We invited her to come see some of our photos of eagles from Alaska. We really enjoyed her visit. Nice lady. She and her husband, who we also met Monday, do a lot of wild life photography. They hope to go to Alaska some day, after the kids are grown. Of course we would love to go back some day. Come back tomorrow to see what we did. We don’t know what it will be. We are flexible.

Tuesday, January 2, 2018

It was a really cold morning. The official low was 19 in Gulf Shores. Our thermometer didn’t go below 23, but that was cold enough. We have been pleasantly surprised at how comfortable we have been living in FRED in these cold temperatures. FRED 2 has better insulation than FRED 1 had and the heat pumps and furnaces have worked great. We have not cleared the antifreeze from the lines yet and have just been using bottled water to flush the toilet and wash dishes etc. We have used the bath houses here at the park as well. The sun was out today but it was after lunch before we got above freezing. Our high was 40. However, they keep changing their minds on the low for the rest of the week so we will wait until tomorrow to decide about unwinterizing. We have waited this long we sure wouldn’t want to do it one day too soon.

While it was 40, we decided to do a little walking around the park. They have made a lot of improvements since were were here last in 2013. We are told most of the improvements have been funded by the BP settlement money. There are new boardwalks everywhere. They are finally rebuilding the old convention center and the bike trails have been greatly improved. None of the projects have been completed but some of the trails and boardwalks are open. Too bad it’s been too cold to ride bikes. We walked out one of the board walks for sunset this afternoon.

The park has begun its winter activities this week. Tonight there was a jam session at the activities building. We decided to go check it out. We know some of our NOMADS friends would have really enjoyed playing with these guys. There were 10 musicians, most of whom appeared to know each other and had been at the park for the winter in previous years. They had 10 guitars, a mandolin, a hammer dulcimer and a bowed psaltery. The music was mostly older songs like “Cajun Moon”, “Wabash Cannonball” and “Margaritaville”. The owner of the hammer dulcimer played a beautiful rendition of “Carol of the Bells”. There was a total of about 30 people in attendance. It was fun and some of the musicians were very good. We haven’t been able to do some of the things we had hoped to do when we planned this little time at the beach before starting our winter projects, but we are having some nice time to just rest, read and relax. Flexibility has been our word for 2018 so far. We will see what tomorrow brings.